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The 2,000 Hour Dream
Eight months. Nearly 2,000 hours. Most of them after everyone went to sleep. Some stolen in the middle of chaos. Some written with one eye open and coffee long since cold. Some outlined in my head while folding laundry or standing at a football field pretending I wasn’t mentally drafting a crime scene. “Give Mommy…
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The Night the Robot Ate Kiwi, the Lizards Cost a Mortgage, and My Body Mutinied
There’s a special level of hell reserved for assembling furniture with wrenches while your nerves feel like they’re being sandblasted from the inside. I know this because I was there. Picture this: I’m mid–stress-induced lupus flare. Joints on fire. Skin hurts to touch. Wearing a shirt feels aggressive. But I’m still on the floor, building bearded…
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The Day the Frog Watched Us Back
This wasn’t a laugh-until-you-cry story. No punchline. No moral neatly wrapped in twine. It was just… nice. Kristopher found a frog in the pool skimmer yesterday. A big frog. Softball-sized. Alive. Slightly offended. Very much not meant to be there. Instead of panicking or launching it into the yard like a cursed object, he let the kids…
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I Am One Minor Inconvenience Away From Becoming a Cryptid
I would like to preface this by saying I am trying. I am hydrated. I have eaten protein. I have breathed deeply through situations that legally qualify as “a lot.” And yet I remain one minor inconvenience away from becoming something people warn their children about. Not a breakdown. A transformation. The kind where neighbors say things like,…
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Elsa, Super Glue, and the Audacity of Motherhood
Harper wanted a Frozen Elsa glass piggy bank. Not plastic. Not silicone. Not “safe for households with toddlers and impulsive gravity experiments.” Glass. We tried to talk her out of it. We explained it was fragile. We used words like breakable and sharp and this will absolutely end in tears. She listened thoughtfully, nodded, and explained that Elsa needed a home for…
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Sleep Cycles: A Multigenerational Lie
Every generation has very strong opinions about sleep. They deliver them confidently. Loudly. Usually unsolicited. And every single one of them swears they’ve cracked the code. Spoiler: they have not. There’s the “keep the house silent” generation. For the love of God, let the baby sleep. No dishes. No TV. No breathing too hard. If I hear a noise,…
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The Tooth Fairy Died in This House
Everyone was sick. (Magically not me but doctors will study this mom phenomenon one day) Not emergency-room sick. Not dramatic sick. Just that low-grade, coughy, fever-adjacent sickness that turns bedtime into a hostage negotiation and guarantees no one sleeps but everyone lies about it. By 8:30 p.m., I had administered meds, water, prayers, and threats…
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I Ended a Partnership and Now the Cat Won’t Speak to Me
I took Harper’s iPad away because she was eating the case. Not chewing on it. Not teething near it. Eating it. To be fair, this was not a solo operation. The cat was already chewing on the silicone like it owed her money. Silicone, apparently, is her drug of choice. Phone cases. iPad cases. Crocs. Anything soft,…
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When I Didn’t Interrupt
Harper fell asleep on my shoulder the way only a three-year-old can, heavy. Trusting. Like my body was exactly where she expected the world to be. Her head tucked just under my chin. Her breath warm. That soft toddler weight that somehow feels both grounding and temporary at the same time. I didn’t move. Lynnlee…
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A Series of Unfortunate Events
It’s been one of those stretches of time where nothing catastrophic happens… but everything hurts a little, something breaks daily, and the universe keeps clearing its throat like it has notes. It started with the backyard. I was cleaning, being productive, pretending I’m the kind of person who flips a hammock without consequences. When I…
Crumbs and Chaos 